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Bar News - February 17, 2006 Making Service Part of the Workplace is Good for the Profession and the Public By: Michael S. Greco, President, American Bar Association
This tension between the law’s public interest roots and today’s business realities must be addressed for the good of the profession and society. Caught between an altruistic spirit and the bottom line, some lawyers now feel less fulfilled in their professional work. Worse, the public’s need for volunteer legal services remains severe. Facilitating pro bono and public service can be good for a legal employer’s business, enriches lawyers’ lives and helps communities in need. I have appointed the Commission on the Renaissance of Idealism in the Legal Profession to help lawyers strike a better balance in their law practices, allowing them to perform public service, volunteer legal assistance to those in need, help improve their communities and, in the process, find greater fulfillment in their legal careers. The commission is led by Honorary Co-chairs U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Theodore C. Sorensen, special counsel to President John F. Kennedy, and is chaired by Mark D. Agrast of Washington, D.C. The need for this commission is great. An ABA survey this year, Supporting Justice: A Report on the Pro bono Work of America’s Lawyers, brings into relief the strained relationship between our profession’s ideals and practices. Of the 86 percent of lawyers who reported doing some form of pro bono work in a year, 70 percent said a “sense of professional duty” and “personal satisfaction” were top motivating factors and 43 percent named “recognition of the needs of the poor” as another. At the same time, 69 percent of these lawyers said “lack of time” and 15 percent said “employer-related issues” were among the top inhibitors to doing more pro bono work. These competing interests must be balanced. More distressing is the need for greater access to legal services in America, especially in low-income communities. Despite pro bono and legal aid lawyers’ best efforts, America’s poor cannot obtain the legal assistance they need. The American Bar Association’s most recent study on access to justice showed that 80 percent of the poor’s legal needs go unmet each year. Closing the Justice Gap, a Legal Services Corporation study this year, yielded a similar result. This is a sad fact in a country with such vast resources. Devastation wrought by hurricanes this year – the legal reverberations of which will be felt for years to come – has only compounded this severe need for greater access to legal services. I charged the commission with developing workplace policies and practices that would enable lawyers to do more pro bono and public service and address these pressing professional and national needs. The commission already has developed a product with immense potential: the Pro bono and Public Service Best Practices Resource Guide. The guide is a free online clearinghouse of more than 160 successful pro bono and public service programs from all practice areas. Lawyers interested in implementing such initiatives at their workplace may use best practices in the guide as models, drawing on other lawyers’ ideas and experiences. The guide can be searched by three categories – initiative type, practice setting and organizational partnerships– as well as by keyword. In addition, legal employers who have implemented effective pro bono programs and public service projects are encouraged to submit them online for inclusion in the guide so their ideas may benefit others in the profession and people in need of assistance. The guide’s potential to help the profession and the public will only grow with greater use. As more lawyers submit best practices, the guide will become more valuable, and as more lawyers consult the guide, pro bono and public service activity will increase, adding balance to lawyers’ lives and benefiting the countless people needing services only lawyers can provide. When I took office as president of the ABA, I issued a call to action asking all lawyers to do more pro bono and public service, but I am not asking lawyers to do it alone. I urge you to visit the commission’s Web site, www.abanet.org/renaissance, to learn from the Best Practices Resource Guide, and to help others by submitting your own. It is time for lawyers to balance professional interests with the public interest. The needs of society, and the future of our profession, depend on it. ABA President Michael S. Greco is the featured speaker at the New Hampshire Bar Association Midyear Meeting Awards Luncheon. This article reflects one of the key themes of his presidency. |
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